Yusaku Kamekura (1915-1997) was a pioneer of Japanese graphic designer whose work established Japans global reputation for the medium. Kamekura is one of those designers whose work I have admired and been vaguely familiar with, without actually knowing it’s author. I stumbled across his outstanding posters for the 1964 Olympic Games in Tokyo while doing some research for a project that I’m hoping will get out of the starting blocks (pun intended); a rebrand of Sussex Athletics Association.

Kamekuras Tokyo 1964 posters stayed in tune with Japanese heritage while representing his modernist principles. Like the rest of his work, they are breathtakingly simple yet dynamic. Kamekura’s work is, to me, how graphic design should be. No tricks or unnecessary flashiness, solid colour, space for the visual elements to breath, elegance and efficiency. One of the greats.

I went to Murcia in Spain recently and found myself wandering around taking photos of typography and book covers. It’s dawned on me that since embarking on my Graphic Design degree I have, happily, turned into a type geek.

Also, spent a lot of time in a great bookshop called antano that seemed to have the best book covers in Spain in one beautiful space. Love the illustration on this book cover below. Buy it here.

And I bought the lovely (and kind of pointless) book, Laberintos (Labyrinths or mazes) below. Buy that here.

Soooo, the next brief for my Graphic Design degree. Play 2 Create: “create a visually dynamic web site that imaginatively interprets the narrative structure, spatial and temporal (time-based) experience and contextual meaning in a cinematic film.” Nice.

This is to be done using Flash and ActionScript. Never done anything with either of those in the past so technically this project may be a ball-ache but conceptually and visually very interesting.

After a little umming and aahing the movie I’ve chosen is going to be the stylish and controversial (at the time) A Clockwork Orange. In the movie of Anthony Burgess‘s novella of the same name Stanley Kubrick visualised a dystopian, near future England where ultraviolent gangs roamed the streets high on Beethoven and milk, looking for their next victim. A little research reveals a dearth of info on Kubrick and the movie but here’s what I like about it:

The ‘Kubrick stare’. As performed by Malcolm McDowell here, Jack Nicholson in The Shining below and Vincent D’Onofrio in Full Metal Jacket below that. Face centre of the screen, head slightly tilted down, eyes looking up and they’re looking at YOU.

Which brings me neatly to the centring of many scenes in Kubrick’s movies. The attention to detail and dramatic effect is amazing. As seen above and these lovely set ups in A Clockwork Orange:

Finally, the architecture in A Clockwork Orange really does it for me. In an era when modernist, brutalist projects and social housing developments were yet to fall from grace, these concrete beauties/monstrosities are a perfect backdrop. First is the Brunel University in Uxbridge AKA the Ludoviko Medical Centre followed by Southmere Lake on the Thamesmead Estate (between Greenwich and Bexley). Finally, Southmere as it is now.

There’s a great video here where Simon Baumann visits the locations in the movie while the narrator reads from Kubrick’s script notes. Interesting stuff.

Despite being a Pompey fan as a kid I was interested in West Ham and Nottingham Forest in the early 80s. In my opinion all three teams have iconic club badges. I’d like to think an eye for a decent logo was why I was attracted to West Ham and Forest but I know it was actually because Forest were winning everything and my old man followed the Irons.

What’s interesting about the Forest badge is it’s redesign in 1973. The club took the unusual step of opening the redesign up to public competition. The competition was won by David Lewis, a Designer and Lecturer in Graphic Design at was then Trent Polytechnic. A potted history of the redesign and Lewis’s proposal can be found here. It’s a great badge that’s stood the test of time whilst holding on to that 70s feel. Interesting too, is the use of the lower case ‘e’, which I’m sure I hadn’t noticed until now.

I won’t go into a detail on the history of Gerd Arntz, it’s out there if you look for it. His pictograms and symbols for Isotype are the precursors to the infographic. Timeless. Archive here: http://www.gerdarntz.org/